What are you doing special this year for the Holiday Wander and the holiday season?

For the holiday season we have a variety of dog and cat toys and treats. We have the specialty items that are a little extra special like gingerbread flavored things that only come out once a year for the doggies and the kitties, and special turkey cranberry treats. For the Holiday Wander, we are offering 10% off, and 20% off on the last night of the Holiday Wander, beds from Bowser beds, which are a very nice quality bed. We’re offering 20% off holiday items and treats, and you never know, spur of the moment we might offer something – so stop by and we’ll see what strikes us.

What stocking stuffers would you suggest for our pets this year?

I think stocking stuffers take the form of small bags of treats, and we certainly have really ample chewies. We just got a really nice selection of antlers and water buffalo horns for dogs – not your everyday holiday gifts, pets have a little bit of a different wish list than we do – but these are good things. I think that holiday gifts can take two forms for dogs, and cats: for cats the gift of food is always welcome. For dogs a lot of people are looking for a treat that will keep them occupied the day of the holiday, so in that regard we would look at bully sticks, antlers, we would look at water buffalo horns, things that would keep them more active. If you just want something adorable, it is going to get cold at some point, we have a wide selection of jackets; we have these lovely (and very slimming) Gold Paw series fleece outfits for the dogs, and that’s always a nice gift. But once again, the gift of food is never unappreciated – for me either!What can shoppers find at the Pet Cabaret that they might not expect?

We have lots of single edible chewies, and that’s ceased to be a thing in big box stores. We lovingly refer to it as the body parts bar. You won’t find smaller, individual single items in other stores. It’s a nice opportunity to do a nice little stocking stuffer -- who wouldn’t want a trachea in their stocking?

We do have a lot of locally made items: 2 Dogs Treats, they are participants in the RVMS Farmers Market, and we stock and sell their stuff. We also have a gentleman from Walpole who does locally made stuff and also contributes a dollar from every package we sell to a local rescue. Even the woman who sells us the antlers is down the Cape. In a lot of ways you can come in, and a lot of items that we have, even if you find them elsewhere, you are not going to find them locally sourced elsewhere.

What are you looking forward to this holiday season?

We are looking forward to people really embracing the whole local thing. We are almost spoiled here in Roslindale because people really do think about shopping locally, but I would just really love to see people patronizing the shops down the Square, patronizing the shops up here. At some point we’d like to see the whole Village area extended up here. That’s our hope for the New Year, that the Village expands and comes up here. We’re now going into our thirteenth year, so we just hope to keep improving and keep learning and keep expanding. There’s so much life and vitality in the independent market and in all the individual stores downtown, and we’ll just keep building on it.